Act of Will: The Fight For Native American Citizenship
Jeffrey R Gudzune, M.A.
With the early expansionist aims of the United States set on driving Native American nations as far away as was conceivable, the young republic effectively redefined its classification of what a “native” was. The guardianship that the United States would eventually claim over the scant remaining Native American states recognized them as a dependency yet excluded them as a part of the populace. Though their affairs were governed under the auspices of the War Department’s Bureau of Indian Affairs, and after 1849 under the same organization within the Interior Department, Native Americans were unique in the legal sense. In the eyes of the American government, the Native American was a foreigner—a political non-entity, lacking civil rights and disenfranchised in large part until the years following the First World War. The early United States had made every effort to herd, surround, and finally dominate every Native American state within the scope of its authority and yet purposely excluded them from becoming citizens of the nation that they were now dependant on. How then did Native Americans assume the responsibilities of American citizenship, and what has been the impact on their culture? To answer that question it is necessary to understand the concept of citizenship as it evolved throughout American history and how Native Americans have owned their citizenship while at the same time maintaining their culture heritage.
The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the Unites States stipulates that citizens are “all persons born or naturalized” within the national borders. Furthermore, the official practice of the United States relative to citizenship is based on two legal concepts; jus sanguinis and jus soli. Jus sanguinis maintains that a child born in the United States holds the citizenship of its parents. If the father of the child is an American citizen then the child shall be an American citizen. Under jus soli, a child born within the borders of the United States is a citizen by virtue of birth, independent of the citizenship of its parents. This is the concept made binding law by the Fourteenth Amendment. However, the legal status of Native Americans was never functionally outlined and therefore children born to Native Americans were not granted citizenship. What is the importance of citizenship and how does it relate to Native American rights?
Inherent in the right of citizenship is the right to vote, the right to receive government services, the right to hold public office, and the right to have the protection of due process of law. Subsequent federal statutes established the process whereby a resident alien, or non-citizen, could become an American citizen. This is a three-fold process, supported by the fourteenth amendment and subsequent legislation. In order to become a U.S. citizen an applicant must file a petition of intent in a federal or state court. This was the means through which many Native Americans eventually gained citizenship. However, there was no existing precedent to support such an application, so the individual applying was left to the prejudices of the judge—with mixed results depending on a variety of factors. The second step to citizenship is the establishment of residency within the recognized borders of the United States or one of its dependencies. Tribal reservations, although semi-sovereign political entities, were finally classified as recognized dependencies when the Department of the Interior assumed oversight of Indian affairs in 1849. By the close of the 1880s, almost every Native American state was within the borders of the U.S and the American government officially abandoned the concept of treating these states as foreign nations and began treating them as dependant. In essence, every Native American was not only a citizen of their own tribal state, but by virtue of this shift in American policy were also resident aliens. It was through this concept that many were eventually granted citizenship, as judges had to recognize that due to this status Indians were no longer foreigners. The third and final step to becoming an American citizen is a hearing before a judge at which the final status of the applicant is determined. In the case of many Native Americans, however, the first step was often impossible.
This is not to say that becoming an American citizen was impossible for the Native American. Keep in mind that the individual states conferred citizenship on numerous Native Americans for their services in the war of 1812, the Mexican War, and the Civil War. These Indians were residents of reservations but also paid taxes to the states in which their reservations were located and owned property within these states. Gradually, two-thirds of the Native Americans living in the United States obtained some form of recognition as citizens. Consequently, the right of citizenship was passed down to subsequent generations through the concept of jus sanguinis.
However, this recognition did not carry with it the right to vote. Furthermore, there was no corresponding federal legislation to provide for the naturalization of Native Americans. For many, the only means of attaining citizenship was to endure this long and often vexing three-step process. It was not until after the reorganization of Indian affairs that many Native Americans managed to get beyond the initial phase of the application process. Even with this, however, it was not an easy process.
The quest for American citizenship is tied to the active involvement of Native Americans in the affairs of the United States, most notably in their service in the American military. Though Native Americans have contributed greatly to the development of the United States as a nation on an agricultural and spiritual level, they were long denied the basic rights of citizenship. In fact, the United States government did not even recognize them as people in the legal sense until the trial of Chief Standing Bear in 1879. This suggestion could make one wonder how the United States could recognize the Native American as dependant and boast to govern their affairs while at the same time adamant that they were ineligible for citizenship. During the aforementioned legal proceeding, Native Americans were finally recognized under the laws of the United States as a people possessing the basic rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. However, this arbiter dictum stopped short of providing for the means through which Native Americans as a whole could gain citizenship. Yet, was becoming a citizen really that important to the Native American people as a whole?
While not a universal quest, becoming an American citizen was not only important but also altogether essential for many who balanced their lives between the reservation and the surrounding republic. Many prominent Native Americans fought their entire lives for recognition as citizens of the United States. Colonel Ely Parker, who lived in the world of the white man as the Commissioner of Indian Affairs and in the world of the Iroquois as a Chief of the Seneca Nation, fought for the right to become a citizen until his death in 1895. Having paid property taxes in the states of New York, Illinois, and Iowa, Parker was the most obvious example of the responsible citizen. During the Civil War, he encouraged other Native Americans to enlist in the Union army and defend not only their own lands but the lands of the whites—for he knew that the destiny of the Native American was very closely intertwined with the destiny of the white man. The Parker family itself recruited an entire unit of volunteer soldiers from the ranks of the Iroquois Confederacy and when they were turned away from the New York militia, they conducted their own drills and were eventually absorbed within the newly minted United States Volunteers, of which Ely Parker was a Colonel.
Despite all the honors and titles that were bestowed on him by the Federal government for his service in the Civil War, Ely Parker was never given the one title he so vehemently fought for—that of American citizen. This was because his citizenship was up to the individual judge to whom he applied. He was not alone. Many Native Americans who had sought enlistment in the Union Army during the rebellion eventually applied for citizenship and were tuned away. These Indians were themselves taxpayers and through their service they had embodied the very spirit of patriotism. It was this spirit that would eventually result in Native Americans being granted the long-denied rights of citizenship. Through their service to the United States in times of war, Native Americans would force the question and demonstrate that they were more than deserving of all the inherent rights and privileges associated with being a citizen of the United States. It would, however, take a federal mandate to assure these rights. For an example of such determination, we turn to Iroquois Confederacy and its record of involvement in the affairs of the United States.
Since the War of 1812, Iroquois men had volunteered to fight for the American Army. Although many were initially turned away as result of racial prejudice, those that did serve fought with distinction and died with honor. Furthermore, many women volunteered as nurses and camp workers in order to assist in what ways they could. This tradition continued throughout the Civil War, thanks to the efforts of Ely Parker and the leaders of the Seneca nation. In 1917, when the United States entered the First World War, the Iroquois Confederacy quickly followed suit.
Their determination to support the United States was so strong that the Six Nations actually declared war on Germany in 1917. They were the first Native American state to adopt an official declaration of war with a European nation since the Seven Years’ War. In response to a need for troops, the United States enacted a conscription law to provide for the enlistment of able-bodied men. The Iroquois soon enacted their own draft legislation at special national council and forthwith dispatched all those who were capable of serving to volunteer for the National Guard. To fund the war, the United States issued war bonds, a great deal of which were purchased by Native Americans who could not serve in military units themselves. When the war concluded, the Iroquois were not invited to sign the treaty of Versailles—a treaty that the United State never actually adopted. In essence, a state of war continued to exist between the Iroquois Confederacy and Germany for another twenty-five years. When hostilities once more broke out between Germany and the United States in 1941, the Iroquois simply renewed the original war act and altered the wording to include Italy and Japan.
The Iroquois were not alone, members of the Navajo, Cherokee, Chippewa, Apache, and Blackfeet tribes also contributed volunteers to the First World War. Choctaw Indians, serving in the barbed wire encircled battlefields of Europe spoke in their own language in order to relay important messages. The Germans were never able to effectively translate these messages and could not understand what was happening behind American lines. Consequently, the War Department began to use the Choctaw and Cherokee languages as code during the final days of the war. During the Second World War, the use of the Navajo language was key to confusing the Japanese and keeping essential battle strategies secret.
For their service, Native Americans who had enlisted in the Army and Navy were granted full citizenship in 1919. This was the first such federal encouragement of Native American citizenship. This legislation meant that all men who were serving in active military units were now citizens of the United States—and by virtue of that, their families could also enjoy the same rights and privileges of citizenship. The concept of jus sanguinis now encompassed Native Americans. However, there was still the issue of some 135, 000 Native Americans who were not actively involved in the military and were without citizenship. They would not have to wait long. After years of withholding their political rights, the United States government finally granted citizenship to all Native Americans with the passage of the Snyder Act on June 2, 1924. By virtue of this legislation, every Native American within the borders of the United States became an American citizen. However, this did not mean that the transition from resident alien to fully empowered citizens was complete. While citizenship was bestowed through federal regulation, there was no implication of the right to vote being conferred on Native Americans. This was a matter for the states to consider and it would be left to the individual states to empower the “Indian-Americans.” With the concept of full faith and credit being one of the keystones of the American government and the federal recognition of Native Americans as citizens it is hard to understand how the states could justify delaying enfranchisement of Indians. Furthermore, how could they get away with what was tantamount to contravening federal law? The answer is simple; those states that withheld the vote enacted their own legislation to curtail the rights of Native Americans citizens in much the same way that southern states had enacted Jim Crow laws to curtail the rights of African Americans. Progress, however slow, will not be stopped. Gradually, the individual states empowered their Native American citizens to vote in elections. Naturally, the federal government was required to intercede once again in order to cement these rights. In 1940, the right of citizenship was once more guaranteed with the passage of the Nationalities Act, which preserved relative tribal autonomy while at the same time reaffirming the right of citizenship to all Native Americans. However, it was not until Utah guaranteed voting rights to its Native American citizens in 1957 that suffrage became universally recognized in the continental United States.
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